Token promoting Abraham Lincoln for president and celebrating Emancipation, 1864. Copper. DeWitt AL 1864-58. OBV: Bust of bearded Lincoln to left enclosed by 13 stars, the date 1864 below. REV: Inscription, FREE/DOM, enclosed by wreath; shield and flags below.
Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was also a shrewd political wager, calculated to shore up support among abolitionists critical of the administration for not acting more decisively against slavery. It only freed slaves in territory controlled by the Confederacy, and so enabled the administration to cloak itself in the moral righteousness of abolition, without risking blowback from the slave-holding border states. In practice, it liberated few slaves, but nonetheless, it was a sweeping departure from existing Federal policy, and was seen, even by Lincoln's critics, as a bold gesture. It transformed the Civil War into a struggle for freedom, and made Lincoln the Great Emancipator.
We see many tokens with this obverse, but seldom the "Freedom" reverse. An unusually well-struck example in near uncirculated condition with pleasing orange patina.
